


amaranthine

by xyrilyn



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, Mild Gore, One Shot, Post-Undertale Pacifist Route
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-03
Updated: 2016-10-03
Packaged: 2018-08-19 08:53:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,655
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8198938
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/xyrilyn/pseuds/xyrilyn
Summary: Over the course of time, Sans learned the hard way that Fate loved screwing with him.First, it was trapping him and his loved ones in the Underground and giving them the freedom they so dearly wanted only after centuries of suffering.Then, it was letting him and his loved ones live perfectly happy lives on the Surface where everyone eventually passed on, happy and entirely satisfied......Everyone... except for him, that is.





	

Soundlessly, Sans ducked into some nearby shrubs as he waited for his prey to emerge from behind the grove and into the clearing ahead. His grip on his hand-carved bow was tight - though not painfully so - and in his other hand was an arrow he had drawn from his quiver earlier.

Just a bit more...

Once the deer was within firing range, he loaded the arrow, pulled the string back, took a single deep breath and then-

The arrow flew straight and true before lodging itself deep in the deer's head. It stumbled for a few steps - crimson blood trailing down its neck and body - before collapsing altogether onto the ground with a thud.

Strapping the bow onto his back, he approached the now-dead deer to collect the spoils of his hunt. The hide might fetch him a decent trade in the nearby villages. He didn't really need all the meat, but he figured he could always just cure them or trade them anyway.

Allowing the blood to drain was going to take a while so Sans... wandered around. For one thing... he was bored. On the other hand, he needed to make sure there weren't any dangerous creatures lurking nearby, intent on grabbing his hunt - or worse still, possibly lunging at him and thus quite likely killing him. He'd checked earlier, but it was always good to double-check. After the blood was all drained, he started removing its internal organs and then the meat. He carefully placed them in separate hide-sacks. After that was done, he dug a hole to bury the carcass.

His work was sloppy - he knew that. Any gatherer and hunter worth their salt would be appalled at his efforts - or more like, the lack thereof. He just didn't feel like grabbing everything he possibly could - since he couldn't possibly carry everything anyway.

He'd ventured quite far from the villages this time, so he didn't enough time to travel back - camping was his only option. It's not like he hadn't done it before, so it didn't really matter to him all that much. He followed a small stream for a while to see where it would lead him. After some time, he found a suitable spot. Sans then proceeded to lazily drop his things down on the ground one by one.

In just another one of his shows of extreme laziness, Sans summoned one of his blasters using magic.

"...Sorry, I'm a bit out of it today. Can you just light up a small fire for me?"

The floating skull nodded sharply before doing just as it was told. It even went as far as nudging wood and dry leaves around to get the fire properly started for its master.

Once the fire was properly going, Sans absentmindedly petted it on the head. It immediately started purring. It gave him a sorrowful look, even as it rubbed its head against Sans' palm, trying to get his attention to no avail.

"Thanks."

The blaster vanished in a puff of magic and then, Sans was alone again.

Wrapping his coat around him tighter, he huddled close to the base of the tree. Staring into the flames, he mentally noted down another day in his mental calendar. A bony hand reached up to where his collarbone was and his fingers met the rough material of a red scarf that was currently wrapped around his neck. The colour of the scarf was no longer as bright as it once was and there were numerous hand-sewn patches of red cloth across its entire length, but Sans just couldn't bring himself to throw it away. It was the last of Papyrus' things that he had left.

He fell into a restless sleep.

When morning came, the fire had gone cold. Grabbing his things, he began the long trek back to one of the villages.

His journey was surprisingly uneventful.

At the gates, he declared himself as clanless and was given entry after the guards thoroughly checked him and his belongings for any sign of the other clan's ingisnia. He headed directly for the marketplace to trade his hunting spoils for some money. He managed to get fifty-two pieces of 'coins' - they were just circular pieces of metal debris with the clan insignia carved onto both sides - which was equivalent to a three-day-stay-with-food at the inn or a five-day-stay without the food. He used ten coin pieces to get his equipment fixed, another twenty to get travel supplies and the rest went into one of his money pouches for safe keeping. Yes, pouches - he had two. One for each clan for when he needed to visit either village. Both clans used their own form of currency.

After he got his usual stuff done, he paid a visit to the training grounds east of the village entrance.

There, he sat beneath a tree and watched as a certain skeleton carried on with his sword training for the day.

Papyrus swung the sword at the side of the straw dummy, easily slicing through the straw and cutting the dummy into two pieces. Before the upper portion of the dummy fell off, he spun around for another strike, halving the upper half mid-air. Nearby, a loud roar momentarily grabbed Sans' attention.

"STRIKE IT AS IF IT WERE YOUR GREATEST FOE! PUT ALL YOUR MIGHT INTO IT!" Undyne roared. Sans could almost imagine a fiery battle aura surrounding her as she said those very words.

A small smile crept onto his face.

"Oh, hello."

A familiar voice drifted over. It reminded him of a warmth long lost.

"I don't believe we've met before. What's your name? My name is Toriel."

'...Toriel.'

Sans put on a friendly smile. "Oh, hey... Welp, I didn't expect anyone to come this way..." he stood up and dusted himself off. "...Well, I'll be going now-"

"Oh no, no, don't let me bother you! I'm merely here because I'm waiting for my child. Please continue whatever you were doing before."

Toriel sat down beside him and Sans couldn't do anything else but sit back down.

"Are you interested in joining the royal warriors?" Toriel asked after a moment.

Sans shook his head. "I'm clanless."

The goat monster was taken aback at this. "Clanless? You should join us then! It's dangerous for you to not have clan to support you. Have you tried speaking with the Chieftain yet?"

"Nah, I willingly chose this fate."

Toriel frowned. "You... deliberately left a clan?"

'If only you knew.' Sans closed his eyes. "I was never born in one."

Toriel's eyes widened. "A... Wanderer?"

A Wanderer was what they called someone who was born outside of any clan. Wanderers were typically nomadic and travelled in small groups of less than two dozen people. Sans nodded. "Sort of, yeah."

"Where are your fellow people then?"

Countless faces surfaced in his mind's eye.

"Dead," he deadpanned.

She gasped and flinched slightly. "I-I'm sorry! I should have been more careful with my words..."

Sans casually waved it off. "It's fine. It happened a very long time ago. I've been on my own ever since."

Toriel, almost hesitantly, began, "...How is it like... living outside these walls?"

She must have never left the village before. Going by the symbol on her dress, Toriel must be a Healer. "It's... peaceful in its own way, I suppose. It's mostly just you and the nature around you. You fall into... a routine... quickly enough."

Sans decided to change the topic. "So, you're a Healer, eh?"

"Master Healer, in fact. That's one of the reasons why I almost never leave these walls," Toriel said longingly.

"What's the other reasons then?"

Toriel settled him with a sad look. "I'm the Chieftain's wife. He'd never let me walk into danger like that, no matter how much I prove to him that I'm perfectly capable of protecting myself."

Toriel started up the conversation again with a non sequitur. "You were looking at them training."

Sans heard the unspoken 'why', but he chose to ignore it.

"Yeah."

She didn't push any further for details. She followed Sans' gaze. "The fiery blue one is Undyne - she's the Chief Warrior. The others are trainee warriors under her guidance. Sometimes, Asriel - my son - would be training there with them as well. He's the Chief Hunter. Sometimes, Alphys - Chief Alchemist - would be sitting here watching Undyne, too."

Sans knew all of this already but he nodded anyway.

"Mom!"

A flurry of brown whizzed past him and leapt into Toriel's arms. Toriel laughed as she swung them around for a moment before placing them gently back onto the ground.

"Oh, Frisk! Welcome back. How did the trade go?"

"It went great! Profits for days!" Frisk giggled. "Who is this?" Frisk said to him. Sans blinked owlishly.

"The name's Sans. Sans the skeleton."

Frisk stared at him for a very long time.

"It's nice to meet you, Sans!" Frisk said, holding a hand out for him to shake.

He shook it.

"It was nice chatting with you, Sans. Do come and visit! Until next time," Toriel said before taking Frisk's hand and walking away. Frisk was as cheerful and energetic as ever.

Frisk didn't recognise him.

Sans left.

.  
.  
.

No one else saw Sans the skeleton after that for years.

.  
.  
.

Plumes of smoke rose into the air.

The ground had been dyed red by blood.

All around, Monsters and Humans were killing each other.

Undyne stabbed a human and roughly pulled the sword out before slashing down another human at the neck who came her way wielding an axe, spraying blood everywhere as they both collapsed to the ground. Nearby, her fellow warriors were cutting down Humans with as much fervour. The Humans were losing - they simply didn't have the strength and overwhelming power that Monsters had. The strongest humans had already fallen.

After almost all the Humans had been killed, a lone human stepped out into the corpse-ridden battlefield. Their face was shrouded by a black cloak. Bright red eyes scanned the field.

"My name is Chara. We Humans will have our revenge - even if there are none of us left to watch it happen."

They began muttering incantations in a language foreign to all. The blood on the ground turned black as it seeped underground. After all the blood had disappeared, they collapsed to the ground, unmoving.

The Monsters celebrated their victory, thinking nothing of the human's words and strange mutterings afterwards.

Months later, a strange disease emerged.

It sent Monsters into an uncontrollable fury - maiming and killing anyone around them. The Monsters had no choice but to kill those who were infected. What they didn't know at the time, was that the disease affected animals, too.

More than half of food they used to obtain from hunting was now unobtainable - animals were in a constant state of frenzy, making it impossible to gather edible meat. Starvation became widespread. People began fighting each other over food. Needless killings began occurring days later. Paranoia and despair spread like wildfire. King Chieftain Asgore was murdered in cold blood while protecting his wife and son when the people raided the stores for food. Any semblance of law and order was entirely nonexistent at this point.

Whatever survivors left survived the chaos only by leaving the village. Most didn't survive the night.

.  
.  
.

Sans silently listened in on their conversation from above.

"We don't have food! None of us have eaten in days! All of us will starve at this rate!" Undyne argued.

"WE WILL EMBARK ON ANOTHER JOURNEY TO FIND FOOD TOMORROW. WE MUST REST TONIGHT. WE CAN'T RISK EVERYONE GETTING KILLED WHILE WE GO OUT LOOKING FOR FOOD! BESIDES, WE ARE EXHAUSTED - WE NEED REST," Papyrus argued back.

A bloodcurdling roar sounded from the bushes. Undyne and Papyrus immediately leapt to their feet, swords in hand. A wild forest boar emerged, rushing headfirst towards a defenceless Toriel and a sleeping Frisk. Alphys managed to jump out of the way but-

Summoning one blaster, Sans slammed said boar with the most concentrated blast he could muster, taking care not to hit Toriel or Frisk by mistake. The blast took out its entire head and upper torso, leaving whatever that was left to fall to the ground in a heap of flesh and blood. He took this as his cue to jump down and join them.

He was immediately met with a sword to the face by none other than Undyne. In the same instant, columns of bones rose from the ground, trapping Undyne in place.

"...Who are you and how did you do that?" Undyne gritted out, suspicious, not at all fazed by the sharp, jagged bones encircling her.

"Sans!" Toriel called out, stopping Undyne in her tracks. Her eyes darted back and forth between Toriel and Sans.

"Y-You know this stranger, Toriel?"

"His name is Sans. He's doesn't mean any harm. Let him go."

Undyne lowered her weapon then. Sans dispelled the bones. He looked at Toriel and then he looked at the bleeding headless boar.

"...I think that's still edible if you-"

"WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN, SANS."

Sans flinched at the volume of her voice. From the corner of his eye, he saw Undyne hauling the boar somewhere behind him.

"...I've been around places."

"WE WERE SO WORRIED."

"We?" he questioned.

"Frisk and I."

Sans blinked. He turned to the now-awake Frisk. Frisk was giving him the biggest, brightest smile he'd ever seen.

"...There were times where we thought you'd gotten yourself killed," Toriel admitted, eyes downcast.

"There are so few of us left. You should stick with us, rather than be on your own, Sans. Loneliness can do unpleasant things to people."

'I'd know that better than anyone, Toriel.'

"...I can't, Tori." Sans turned to leave. Toriel stood up to stop him. "Wait!" Sans shot a single, wistful look at Papyrus before teleporting away, leaving behind a a group of stunned monsters.

.  
.  
.

Days passed.

Toriel, Frisk, Alphys, Papyrus and Undyne were huddled in a cave, shivering. Frisk had fallen ill some time ago and the others were exhausted. Food was increasingly scarce. It seemed the fury that the animals went through caused them to ravage the forest as well, destroying what could have been fruits and edible leafy plants.

They were starving. Neither of them had any energy left to go out scavenging. It was too dangerous for any of them in their current state anyway.

Toriel had long resigned herself to dying in this cave. However, she wanted no one here to die of starvation - it was an excruciating way to go.

Mustering all the strength she could, she made sure everyone else was still asleep before trying to leave the cave. She could possibly find some mushrooms around that she could use to-

Outside, she saw Sans. Healthy, unharmed and ever grinning.

Toriel thought his grin was more... forced, this time.

"Sa-"

A blue fog wrapped around her as Sans extended his hand. She opened her mouth to say something but Sans put one bony finger to his lips to shush her. He shook his head. Everything clicked into place then. The horror must have been obvious on her face because Sans' grin faltered.

Sans placed her back down against the cave wall by Frisk's side. Toriel was powerless to stop him. She only watched as Sans conjured several strange floating skulls - one for each of them.

Toriel looked at Sans pleadingly - begging him to at least allow them to say their farewells.

He fired the gaster blasters at point blank range.

.  
.  
.

He buried their bodies at the foot of Mt. Ebott where their previous reincarnations were put to rest as well.

.  
.  
.

Wrapping the red scarf tighter around his neck, he began his trek again.

He'd been to the highest mountaintops and the deepest of valleys already. He visited the tropics last year. Perhaps, he should visit the arctic again.

Without a destination in mind, he began wandering again.

**Author's Note:**

> This was just an idea that I needed to write to get it out of my system - so there you go.
> 
> I don't know why or how Sans remains immortal (?) / unchanging (?) through the passage of time - I'll let you speculate about that.
> 
> As I was writing this, I did not picture Sans as immortal - he is perfectly mortal and capable of dying (or is he?).
> 
> I don't know how much time has passed since the canon events in Undertale took place. It could have been a single lifetime - or it could have been centuries - I don't know. I like to think that more than one lifetime has taken place, though. Regardless, anything goes.
> 
> Magic became a thing of legend. Neither Monsters nor Humans are born with the innate ability to control their magic. Anyone and everyone who could have passed on such knowledge to future generations have all died. How that happened - I leave to your imaginations.
> 
> I have ideas for some of these questions, but I'd rather leave these open to interpretation.


End file.
